Epidemiology and Aetiology of Testicular Cancers

Abstract

Testicular cancer is the most common malignancy encountered among males aged 20–40 years and accounts for 1–1.5 % of cancers in men and 5 % of all urological tumours [1]. There is a significant geographic variation in the incidence of this malignancy especially germ cell tumours (GCTs): Scandinavian countries, Germany and Switzerland record the highest incidence, while the lowest is reported in African and Asian countries [1]. The estimated incidence of testicular tumours in Western countries is 3–10 new cases per 100,000 males per year [2]. In the last 30–40 years, a trend towards an increased testicular cancer incidence has been documented in the majority of industrialized countries, especially in Northern European countries, North America and Oceania [3–6]. It has been suggested that the birth cohort hypothesis plays a major role towards this trend, as Nordic men born around 1943 and 1968 showed lower incidences than men born just before or just after these dates [4, 7, 8].